


Burning Ewok

by imperatrixxx



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Ben clearly shops at Hot Topic, Body Paint, Burning Man, Come for the snark stay for the feels, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Crack treated crackily, Drinking, Drug Use, Emo Kylo Ren, Fluff, Humor, Leia ships it, M/M, No actual ewoks were harmed in the writing of this fic, Poe has the patience of a saint, Poe is protective, Rating is for later chapters, Romance, Smut, Snark, Virginity, brief dub-con touching by a third party, glow sticks, steampunk !?!, x-wing kink (implied)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-25
Updated: 2016-03-27
Packaged: 2018-05-29 00:31:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6351733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imperatrixxx/pseuds/imperatrixxx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ben Solo, training as a Jedi and then as Snoke’s apprentice, never really got to be a teenager, but he’s making up for it now. After Ben's return to the light, Leia assigns Poe Dameron to be his minder, and the pilot finds himself babysitting the galaxy’s most annoying 30-year-old man-child. To his surprise, he discovers they have a growing physical and emotional connection. <br/>Featuring Ben’s inevitable Emo Goth phase, silver hot pants, and the Burning Planet festival on Jakku.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I needed a break from the angst orgy of writing “This Thing of Darkness I Acknowledge Mine” so I returned to my native genre, snark-fluff, for a brief interlude. The crack, smut, and feelings will all increase as this goes along.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Poe keeps rescuing Ben and, in between all the snark, finds he doesn't really mind.

 

I'm really too old for this, thought Poe, as he sat in the dive bar, watching Ben Solo gulping down sugary snekfruit cosmopolitans and flinging himself at everyone in sight.

_“You’re the only one I can trust with this delicate task,” General Organa had informed him during their meeting at the new Resistance base on Ruusan. Poe had waited to learn about a dangerous mission that would require all of his skill and courage as a pilot. There hadn’t been a lot for him to do in the months following Kylo Ren’s murder of Snoke and the fall of the First Order. “As you know, my son recently returned to the light,” continued the general._

_“Yes.”_

_“I sent him away to train with Luke when he was 13, and even before then Snoke was in his head corrupting him. After he became Snoke’s apprentice, he was living in isolation, training constantly, and barely ever interacting with anyone without a mask on.”_

_“I can’t see what this has to do with my mission.”_

_“What I mean is that he never had a proper adolescence. He never got to enjoy himself or rebel.”_

_“It seems like he rebelled just fine. I can hardly think of someone who did it more effectively.”_

_“In the normal teenage way, I mean, not in the emulating-his-grandfather sense.”_

_“Oh, like sex and drinking and loud music?”_

_“Something like that,” the general said stiffly._

_“And how am I supposed to help? I’m a bit over my own wild youth, I’m afraid.”_

_“I need someone to keep an eye on him, to keep him safe. There are many in the Resistance who don’t believe that he has really returned to the light, and who would like revenge for what he did as Kylo Ren.”_

_“You don’t think I’m one of those people?” Poe, after all, had good reasons to harbor a grudge against the man who had tortured him._

_“I know you’re not, Poe.” She was right, of course. His sympathy had grown when he had learned of Ben Solo’s corruption by Snoke._

_“Can’t he look after himself? Surely he can use his Force powers if he gets in too much trouble.”_

_“That’s what I’m worried about. Even after he killed Snoke, his amnesty was a politically divisive issue. If he goes around hurting people and destroying things in fits of rage, the New Senate will revoke it.”_

Which is how Poe Dameron, the best kriffing pilot in the Resistance, found himself in a dark, seedy bar while the erstwhile Master of the Knights of Ren downed overpriced purple cocktails and flirted (badly) with strangers of every possible gender and species. Poe nursed his non-alcoholic beer (he was the designated pilot after all) and tried to ignore the insipid lite jazz that every bar band in the galaxy seemed to play. So, here he was, chauffeur, bodyguard, and babysitter to the most powerful and least socialized man-child in the galaxy.

Reluctantly, Poe had to concede that Ben looked … not unlovely this evening. He was wearing black skinny pants that complemented his ridiculously long legs and a nerf-leather jacket. His nails were also painted black, and his eyes were lined in kohl. He currently had one arm around a willowy long-necked Quermian woman, seemingly oblivious to her hulking Dowutin boyfriend, who was lumbering towards them, chin-horns trembling with fury. BB-8 chirruped in concern. “I know, buddy, I see him.”

Poe had, in recent weeks, used a variety of tactics to extract Ben from difficult situations. Sometimes the threat of a fist or a blaster worked, but more often Poe relied on his famous charisma. Neither violence nor charm, however, was likely to pacify a raging Dowutin. Poe set down his warm beer, and wandered over. At least he could enjoy this.

“Sweetheart! There you are!” He looped himself under Ben’s spare arm, and stood on his toes to land a sloppy kiss on the taller man’s neck. Ben looked down at him in shock. Poe elbowed him in the ribs. “Try to keep up,” he hissed. The Dowutin glowered at them both as Poe pulled Ben away from the four-armed Quermian. “Sorry about my boyfriend,” Poe turned his dazzling smile on the hulking male. “He’s just so friendly when he’s drunk. Aren’t you, _princess_?” Poe gazed indulgently at Ben, who was still staring at him in horror. “I think it’s time I got you home,” he raised one eyebrow suggestively.

“You boys have a nice night!” the Dowutin bellowed after them, laughing, as Poe dragged Ben from the bar and BB-8 spun out after them.

“Princess!?” sputtered Ben, stumbling a bit against Poe, as they entered the cool night air.

“It’s technically true, isn’t it?”

“No, technically, I would be a prince.”

“Ah, yes, Ben Solo, immortal Prince of Darkness,” snorted Poe.

“Shut up.”

“Don’t I even get a ‘thank you’ for saving your sorry ass yet again?”

“Thank you, Poe Dameron, for saving my sorry ass yet again.” He mimicked sulkily.

Poe parked the shuttle in the hangar, and then helped Ben back to General Organa’s house. On the flight back, Ben’s mood had turned from punchy to morose. “Do you hate me?” he asked Poe.

“No.”

“You should. Everybody hates me.”

“Ben, you are an irritating, overgrown adolescent with the decision-making skills of a rancor, but I don’t hate you.”

“I don’t hate you either,” Ben said, enunciating very carefully.

He helped Ben up the stairs to his room and went to get him a glass of water.

“Do you think I’m pretty?” Ben asked, when he returned. Ben was lying on his bed, fully dressed. His hair was a mess, and his eye makeup was smeared. Poe sat down and began pulling off the younger man’s sneakers.

“Yes, I think you’re pretty. You’re the prettiest princess,” Poe replied, but Ben was already snoring.

*

“Just once, don’t you want to go out to a nice dinner? Or go to a proper concert? The kind where you sit down on a chair and nothing is covered in mud?”

“You are soooo boring,” said Ben, tugging him along. “Come on, the Wrathtars are about to start. Their lead singer is the guy from Sarlaxx.”

“No. Here I draw the line. I’m going to wait here where this nice young man,” he indicated the nearest stage where a sad looking Teedo in a cardigan was singing quietly to his own shoes, “is performing in a reasonably tuneful way, and you can meet me back here. BB-8 will look after you. He likes your awful music.”

 _“You have no respect for me. You only want me for pieces,”_ warbled the Teedo sadly in the background.

Ben and BB-8 returned some time later trailing two young Twi’lek women. Ben was wearing a coronet of cheap fake flowers with ribbons trailing down the back. It looked ridiculous with his ripped black jeans and his faded “Death Star for Cutie” t-shirt.

“Ohhh, you’re right. He _is_ cute,” the green-skinned Twi’lek cooed, “in an elderly kind of way.” She too was wearing a flower crown.

Ben blushed. “Poe, I would like you to meet Juno and Hestia. Poe is a pilot and a Resistance hero.” The girls giggled. The bluer Twi’lek, Juno, had one of her prehensile head tentacles draped possessively around Ben’s shoulders, and its tip was caressing his face softly. Poe found himself instantly and uncharacteristically irritated. He had been out in the sun all day and he was dehydrated and now these flowery strumpets – these _very pretty_ flowery strumpets – had attached themselves to Ben.

“Here, you need to wear one of these,” Ben snatched the headdress from Hestia and, laughing, attempted to place it on Poe’s head.

“Don’t, Ben!” Poe tried to bat away the taller man, making him laugh harder. “I said _stop_!” He snapped. It came out sharper than he had intended.

“Oooh,” Juno said, “the pilot has a temper!”

“I’m sorry,” Poe looked abashed. “I’m usually pretty easy going. I guess I’ve just had a long day.”

“I think,” said Hestia to Juno, “that maybe he doesn’t like you all over his boy toy.”

“I think you’re right,” she agreed, unwrapping her sinuous turquoise lekku from Ben’s neck and plucking the crown from his head.

“I’m sorry if I messed that up for you,” said Poe as the Twi’leks walked away.

“No, it’s fine,” said Ben. “I’m not interested in girls anyway. I mean, _obviously_.”

 

“I’m sorry you hate everything we do," said Ben during the flight home. “We can go to see an art exhibition or something if you want.”

“It’s OK, I don’t have to like these things. It’s your lost childhood we’re indulging here.” He softened his words with a smile.

“Oh, right,” pouted Ben. “I forgot. We’re not actual friends. I’m an assignment.”

“Come on, Ben. Don’t be like that.” Poe engaged the autopilot so he could turn to face the man in the co-pilot's seat. “Of course we’re friends.”

“I don’t see how we can be.” Ben looked entirely miserable. “I mean, I tortured you. And I’m so sorry, and I realize that saying sorry doesn’t mean anything, but I don’t know what else I can do,” he sniffled.

“I don’t think about that when I’m with you,” Poe took Ben’s chin, angling his face so their eyes met. “I think about someone who fought back against everything he had been programmed to do, someone who came back to the light, even though that was the most difficult thing, someone who is now doing his best to live his life,” he paused, wiping a trace of moisture from Ben’s cheek, “even if his taste in music and drinking establishments is appalling.”

*

“Why do I have to take you to the emporium on Ubrikkia? I might have other important things to do. I do have an actual job, you know.”

“I need to get some things.” Ben said crossly. “Some clothes and shit that I can’t get on Ruusan. You can stay in the shuttle. It’s not like I want the company.”

“You don’t have your pilot’s license!” It suddenly dawned on Poe. “You are descended from some of the best pilots in history and you can’t fly!” He crowed.

“I left home young, OK. And then there was no one to teach me afterwards. Please just leave it alone.” He crossed his arms and sulked harder.

“I’ll teach you.”

“Really?”

“Sure. I’m considered quite a good pilot, actually.” Poe smirked.

“What do you want in return?”

“What? I don’t need anything in return.”

“I could teach you to use a lightsaber.”

“OK, that would be amazing.”

Ben was mostly not such a bad student. His reflexes and spatial sense were excellent and he was a quick learner. His temper, though, – well everyone knew about his temper. Still, Poe was pleased with his progress and there were only a few extra dings on the shuttle. It would be a warm day on Hoth before Poe let Ben near his starfighter though.

Poe enjoyed the lightsaber lessons far more than the flying lessons. “You’re never going to have much reach,” said Ben, as they battled with wooden practice swords, “but your form is excellent.” Poe preened a little at the praise. “Why don’t we move on to the real thing?”

Poe had had no idea that Ben still had the highly unstable lightsaber he had made as Kylo Ren. “That looks dangerous.”

“That’s the idea. Actually it’s a _terrible_ lightsaber. I need to try to make one with a better crystal.”

Ben demonstrated his kata, perhaps showing off a bit. Poe watched, dry mouthed. Ferrying around the moody man, he had almost forgotten that he was also a powerful and dangerous force user, a highly trained killing machine, a finely honed weapon. He was simultaneously graceful and intensely masculine, as he leapt and pivoted, slashing the plasma blade through the air.

Ben powered off the saber and handed it to Poe. “Be careful of the side vents when you turn it on.”

Poe gingerly activated the saber and watched as it flared to life, sparking erratically. Ben stood behind him, flush against his back, and covered his arms with his own, wrapping Poe’s hands on the hilt in his own much larger hands. He guided Poe through the motions. Poe felt his heart beating hard as Ben’s heat enveloped him from behind and the deranged saber crackled angrily in front. Although Poe had always liked bad boys, he had never had a thing for actual villains (he had said “ewww” loudly when Jess Pava had suggested that General Hux was “kind of cute”), but still there was something strangely arousing at the thought of being sandwiched in between the man formerly known as Kylo Ren and his volatile saber.

Poe put that thought aside for later.

*

“Where are we headed tonight?” queried Poe Dameron, best chauffeur in the Resistance.

“Dance party on Coruscant.”

Ben looked amazing. He was wearing tight black leather pants, tall chunky boots, and a loose black shirt that seemed to have lost most of its buttons in a tragic accident, revealing a wide triangle of his broad, pale chest. He had applied his customary eyeliner and gloss that emphasized his plump lips. Poe suspected he had also used some blush to bring out the dramatic contours of his lovely cheekbones.

The party, though, had Poe longing for Ben’s usual seedy bars. The thumping bass was giving him a headache. Ben emerged from the sea of sweaty bodies to press a blue glow stick into his hand. “Look, now you’re a Jedi,” he said. “Fight me!” He thrust at Poe with his own pink glow stick before collapsing into paroxysms of laughter.

“Did you take something?” Poe looked at him worriedly.

“Definitely not. Most definitely not at all in no way.” Glow-stick battle forgotten, Ben pulled Poe into the heaving mass of bodies and slung his arms around the smaller man’s neck, pulling them together. Poe found his face pressed against the exposed swathe of Ben’s sweaty chest. Ben ground against him, and his body responded, rather desperately.

“Stop it, Ben.” Poe hastily disentangled himself.

“You’re no fun,” Ben pouted and then stomped off into the crowd.

Poe rarely minded his lack of height, but it made it hard to locate someone in a crowd. When he finally found Ben, he was being pushed up against a wall by a scruffy looking blond man. The man had his hands under Ben’s shirt and a knee between his legs, and he was sucking enthusiastically on his neck.

Poe didn’t get angry often, but when he did it was like a hot spike of lightening out of a blue sky. He picked up the man by his greasy collar and flung him across the room, and then grabbed Ben by the arm and started dragging him away.

“Awww, Poe,” slurred Ben, “he was going to suck me off in the bathroom.” Poe shot him a disgusted look.

“You’re not in any state for that. He was taking advantage.”

“I have the Force. I can look after myself.”

“You have the Force, but no damn common sense.” Poe hauled him across the parking lot.

“Why are you angry? Are you jealous?” A smile bloomed across Ben’s features.

“No!” shouted Poe too loudly. He wrenched open the door to the shuttle and shoved Ben inside. Ben stumbled and caught himself on the co-pilot’s seat, giggling.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to push you.” Poe forced himself calm. The brief, intense summer storm of his fury had passed.

“No harm done,” Ben, now sitting on the chair, wrapped his arms around Poe’s waist. “You’re beautiful when you’re angry,” he snuggled contentedly into Poe’s belly. Poe carefully unwove Ben’s clinging arms.

“Let’s get you home.”

“Can’t go home. Home is full of boring important old people.”

“Blast!” Poe had forgotten that the general was hosting a dinner for visiting dignitaries, and those affairs often went late into the night. Poe didn’t like his chances of trying to sneak an inebriated Ben into the house undetected.

“Mom will never forgive me if I puke on a senator.”

“It might undermine your redemption narrative,” Poe agreed, and so he found himself helping Ben back to his own quarters instead. _This is a very bad idea_ , his brain informed itself. “You take the bed.” He deposited Ben unceremoniously on said piece of furniture.

“You could join me,” Ben smiled up at him through long lashes, pulling the minimally functional shirt over his head. Poe tried not to admire his well-developed shoulders, muscular chest, and hard abdominals.

“What _did_ you take?”

“Some mushroom from Naboo.” Ben reached for Poe, pulling him down onto the bed and nuzzling his neck. At least the Naboo mushrooms - a neurotransmitter stimulant, with aphrodisiac properties – weren’t going to do more than give Ben a bad hangover. Poe had tried them himself, many years ago.

Poe got up from the bed, and then bent back down to plant a gentle kiss on Ben’s forehead. “Go to sleep, Ben.” He grabbed a pillow and a blanket and retreated to the sofa. He lay awake long after he heard Ben’s breathing even out into the gentle rhythms of sleep.

 

“Where’s the bantha?” groaned Ben.

“What bantha?”

“The one that crapped in my mouth.”

“What are you, 12?” Poe groused at the groggy man who collapsed onto a dining chair. He shoved a plate of egg and potatoes at him, along with a strong cup of caf and a couple of painkillers. “This will help.”

“Why are you being so nice to me?” Ben’s makeup from the previous night had formed dark circles under his eyes.

“You’re my friend, and also your mother asked me to take care of you.”

Ben scowled at that. “Not to let me have any fun, you mean.”

“You seem to be having plenty of fun.”

“You know what I mean. Anytime someone is interested in me, you drag me away.”

“Ben, I’m not letting you have sex in some dirty bathroom when you are too drunk to know what you want.”

“Well, how am I ever going to have sex, if you keep doing that?”

“Do you mean you haven’t _ever_?”

Ben blushed deep crimson. “There wasn’t really much opportunity. Between Jedi training and the First Order.”

“Well, your first time certainly shouldn’t be in some revolting club. We need to find you a nice boyfriend.”

“And how exactly am I going to do that? I mean do I tell him about Kylo Ren on the first or second date? ‘Oh, by the way, I used to be a psychotic assassin for the First Order, but I’m better now.’ Who exactly is going to want to date me? ”

“You might be surprised. Maybe you’ll find someone who’s into that.” A small smile quirked Poe’s lips. “Some nice boy with a dark Jedi fetish. Then you can just say ‘Hey, babe, wanna come upstairs and see my interrogation chair?’”

Ben groaned and dropped his head into his hands. Poe smirked. He had finally found a way to shut Ben up.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amidst the craziness of Burning Planet, Ben and Poe begin to realize the extent not just of their attraction, but of their emotional connection. Ben reveals an unexpected side to himself.

“We already went to a music festival,” muttered Poe. He recalled a laughing Ben, wearing a lopsided coronet of fake flowers, attempting to crown Poe with a similar piece of headwear. The memory of Ben’s dazzling smile, the late afternoon sun, and the smell of grass momentarily distracted him.

“This isn’t a music festival. It’s an _experiment in community and art_ ,” Ben was lecturing him. “How could you object to that?”

“Where do I even start? It’s hot and noisy and it goes on for days.”

“I take it you would rather see some deathly dull Old Republic play, or go to a museum, or a farmer’s market. You’re so old.”

“I’m three years older than you. I’m just not an idiot.”

“Don’t worry, there will be lots of other sad middle aged men there trying to recapture their lost youth, so you’ll have company.”

“Oh yes, _I’m_ the one trying to recapture lost youth.”

Despite practically begging General Organa for a mission that would require his absence during the festival, she had insisted that he take the time off to accompany Ben. Poe suspected she was enjoying his discomfort at Ben’s antics, or perhaps she just wanted a few days of peace and quiet.

“Why do they have to hold it on _Jakku_ of all places? It’s the worst world in the galaxy.” Poe was still complaining as they made their landing approach. Below them tens of thousands of campsites were arranged in a circular grid that looked suspiciously like the Death Star. In a large crater located just above the circle’s equator stood a giant wicker effigy of an Ewok. “I can’t believe they call it Burning Planet.”

“Why?”

“Well, it sounds very Dark-Side doesn’t it? Like the name of a weapon I’ll be blowing up a year or two from now. Maybe I can persuade your mother to let me bomb Jakku. I bet there are lots of fugitive First Order types at this thing.”

Poe parked their shuttle and threw their bags down the ramp. “Careful!” yelled Ben. “My outfit’s in there.” The costume bag, Poe noticed, was larger and heavier than those containing the tent, blankets, and food. Poe and Ben left the shuttle, kicking up clouds of dust as they went. BB-8 had declined to accompany them, insisting that he had had enough of Jakku for a lifetime. Poe quite agreed.

They wandered through the temporary city, taking in a spectacular variety of species and costumes: a bipedal cerulean amphibian dressed only in shards of broken mirrors, the top half of his face painted deep lilac; a woman covered entirely in deep red feathers; a Night Sister or someone dressed like one. They passed figures on stilts and hooves, with horns and scales, exoskeletons and armor. Mutant speeders drove past, decked out as a sea monster with giant teeth, a happabore skeleton, and a rainbow-hued replica of a TIE-fighter. Poe, in his usual casual attire, felt completely out of place.

Ben helped Poe set up the tent and arrange its rudimentary furnishings, and then stood in the middle of the small space, pulling off his clothes to change into his costume. Poe, lying on his camp mattress, tried not to ogle too obviously as Ben stripped off his tunic, revealing his bare chest, before turning around, in some small show of modesty, and wriggling out of his leggings and underwear.

Poe stared at the broad scarred back, the perfect ass, and the long muscular legs. Ben rummaged through his bag until he found a scrap of shiny silver fabric, and then shimmied into what turned out to be the galaxy’s tiniest pair of hot pants.

“You know I can feel you watching me,” Ben smiled over his shoulder. “It’s a Force thing.”

“If you didn’t want me looking, you should have found somewhere more private to get changed.” Poe huffed, hoping the dim light of the tent obscured his flaming cheeks.

“Come and help me with this.” Ben thrust a pot of silver body paint at him. “I need it all over.” Ben plunged a hand into the pot and began smearing it onto his own face and arms, and then knelt before Poe, so he could reach his back and shoulders.

Poe regarded the impossible silver and white creature, head bowed before him. He dipped his hands into the paint and slid them over Ben’s shoulders, back, and neck and down across his chest, feeling the muscles tensing beneath his touch. He got lost in the contrast between the cool viscous paint and the warm skin.

“I should have put on my boots first,” Ben observed, standing up. The boots in question were silver, thick-soled and knee-high with far too many buckles up the side.

“Let me,” Poe knelt between the man’s legs. He was painfully aware of his own labored breath against one shining thigh, and of his proximity to the straining fabric of the hot pants. He focused on putting on Ben’s socks and then fumbled to buckle the boots. He longed to reach forward to grab Ben’s hips and rub his face against the cloth, to mouth the growing hardness, to relax his throat so he could --

“I don’t look too much like C-3PO do I?” Ben asked, indicating his metallic body, and derailing Poe's thoughts.

Poe, still kneeling at his feet, laughed. “Nothing like him. Trust me.” He dug his nails into his own palms, willing his arousal under control.

Ben extracted a large box from his costume bag and pulled out several long pieces of metal and a toolbox. He began arranging the parts on the floor.

“What are you doing?” Poe watched curiously.

“Assembling my wings.”

“Please tell me they aren’t X-wings. If you dress up as an X-wing, I swear I won’t let you leave the tent,” Poe growled.

“Would you like that? I didn’t know you felt that way about your ship.”

“Trust me, all pilots do.”

“You’re safe, they’re not X-wings.” Ben laughed, and as they took shape, Poe could see that the wings were not crisscrossed like those of his starfighter, but folded like a giant avian at rest.

Poe helped Ben strap the apparatus onto his back, using a leather harness that crossed over his chest. The wings were lightweight and sleek. An intricate central mechanism of gears and springs attached on each side to a hinged arm terminating in three folded phalanges. The armature was covered in tiers of blade-like metal feathers, the longest of which almost brushed the ground.

“Where did you get them?”

“I made them. What do you think I do all day while you’re at work?”

Poe had assumed that Ben slept, mostly. “That’s quite impressive.” He considered the hundreds of hours of work that must have gone into their creation.

“You learn how to work duralumin to make a lightsaber. I guess I should have been working on my new saber, but I’ve wanted to go to Burning Planet for years.” Ben sounded suddenly shy, or as shy as a man clad only in silver body paint could be.

“What are you?” Poe indicated the shimmering alien into which Ben had transformed.

“I don’t have a name, yet,” he said, still self-conscious. “Snoke took me and made me into Kylo Ren – nothing about him was my own design. I used to dream of a winged being, like an angel from Iego, carrying me away. Then, as I grew up, I realized no one was coming to rescue me and that I would have to save myself.”

“So you became the creature of your dreams.”

“I guess,” Ben did not meet Poe’s eyes.

Poe rose and stood on his toes. Mindful of the paint, he pressed the lightest kiss to the silver lips. “You’re beautiful. Magnificent.”

Ben’s rare radiant smile illuminated his face. He placed his hands on Poe’s shoulders and kissed him back, harder. Poe desperately wanted to shove his tongue into Ben’s mouth, to push him down onto the thin mattress, wings be damned, to lick and taste and bite every inch of his painted flesh, to tear off those useless silver pants, and hoist Ben’s ankles over his shoulders, and – and yet.

And yet.

Ben – breathtaking, extraordinary Ben – seemed balanced on a knife’s edge of becoming, as though a breath of air could push him either way. He was fanning a secret flame that had simmered for years beneath the cold dark layers of Kylo Ren, and Poe did not want to risk smothering that nascent glow with his own consuming need. Ben needed to unfurl his shimmering wings in the light.

Poe took a deep breath and stepped back from Ben. “I feel a bit underdressed, or overdressed.”

“I figured you would, so I brought you something.” Ben returned to his bag. “Take off your shirt,” he ordered, “and put this on.” He thrust a gleaming mass of fabric into Poe’s hands. Poe shook it out into a cloak made of thousands of iridescent gold and snow-white feathers that rippled and shone like starlight on water.

“What is this?” marveled Poe, stroking the sleek surface. “Where did you get it?”

“Out of what my mother calls the ‘princess dress up box’ in the attic. Some diplomat from Bakura gave it to her years ago. I figured she wouldn’t mind you borrowing it for the occasion.”

Poe’s costume was organic and comforting while Ben's was all unyielding metallic edges; for all that Poe’s element was howling durasteel and the blackness of space, was this how Ben saw him? “What am I supposed to be?” He asked, as the whisper-soft cloak enfolded him.

“A sun god? A star? A giant space chicken?” Ben joked. “Wait, one more thing.” He pulled out a small jar and coated his fingers in grease, smirking suggestively.

“What are you doing?” Poe asked, breathless.

In response, Ben reached out his oiled hands to spread the subtle golden unguent over Poe’s chest. Ben’s hands were firm on his pectoral muscles. He rubbed his fingertips over Poe’s hardening nipples, burnishing his bronze skin, and then drifted lower to caress his abdomen.

“Ben, stop.” Poe groaned.

“Stop what?” Ben asked with mock innocence.

“Teasing me.”

“Who says I’m teasing?”

“Do you want to leave the tent or not? Because this was a lot of trouble to go to,” Poe gestured at their collective attire, “to stay inside all week.”

“Later, then,” Ben whispered, leaning down to nip his ear.

Outside the tent, the merciless sun was screaming at the sand. Ben waved his hand and his metallic wings flapped and whirred open. The light flashed through the spinning blades as they extended to their full four-meter span. Now Poe could see the true artistry of their construction. Each wing had three layers of plumage: minute overlapping leaves on the leading edges, beneath those the larger covert feathers, and finally the great primary and secondary quills. The outermost pinions were spread like outstretched fingers, grazing the sky.

Poe stared at the dazzling vision. Ben was a statue carved from light, a nameless wild creature of metal and bone, something Poe could never hope to capture or to tame.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, now this is the fic where Kylo Ren has wings. Steampunk wings. I'm sorry. I have no excuses. (I wish I could draw it though.)
> 
> Also, you know Leia has the best "princess dress up box" and that Ben loves raiding it.
> 
> Finally, is there some kind of slash writing award for having the lube accounted for a whole chapter ahead of time? And it has gold sparkles! That’s how you know this is the fancy crack.

**Author's Note:**

> According to _The Visual Dictionary_ , all Teedos are named Teedo. I assume that angst over this lack of differentiation leads some of them to play sad acoustic music.


End file.
